I didn't realise this chapter was showing html stuff orz I'm sorry to any who it inconvenienced, the reason for such a long time to change it was down to me not seeing it myself and also having no-one tell me. If you came here thinking this was a new chapter to see it's not, I'm also sorry for that.

Days, but not yet weeks, had passed since Crona had gotten over being ill and the group was once again properly together. As they, once again, sat out on one of the balconies of the DWMA sitting on the stone benches with feet against the tiled floor, on yet another sunny (but fairly brisk) day. The group was in full flow and filled with talk of meeting up, what work they were stuck on in class as well as general chit-chat. Eventually they had all finished eating and it was almost time for class, so they decided to head back a little earlier. As Kid got up to leave he was stopped by a lone Crona "Oh! I thought you left with Maka." Kid clarified in his surprise, to which Crona shook hir head and told him "I wanted to talk to you... alone, I mean..." this left Kid with an increased pulse to which he had no explanation "I see, was there a topic you had in mind?"
"Yes," ze said almost too quickly in worry "It wasn't just spur of the moment, I should have said earlier I-"
"Calm down, Crona." Kid asked soothingly "It's fine either way; now what did you want to talk to me about?"
"...Well, I know it must have been a pain to look after me... and I probably disturbed your schedule, when you came to visit me."
"Not at all." Kid assured hir "You say that, but I still feel bad so... I was wondering if you wouldn't mind, maybe..." there was a slightly longer pause than usual, where Crona tried to bring hirself to talk "Maybe, meeting up? If you don't mind of course!"
"Hmm..." Kid took a moment to think "Truth be told, Crona, it did occur to me that the only times we've really been together properly, have been situations like the previous weeks." Kid replied "So actually, meeting up with one another is a very nice idea." Kid attempted to still seem as calm as possible still being almost painfully aware of them still being alone. As he finished his sentence he felt himself become immune to the cold, as the smile on Crona's face from his answer sent him into enough heat to convince him it was the middle of summer as opposed to winter. "So that's why you're still here." Maka added, only appearing once they'd finished "You should have said earlier, Crona. I was worried where you went." Kid tried to agree with her but before he could was interrupted by Maka continuing with "Also, if you want to meet up you should do it at the weekend: that way you can stay round the for the night," Crona's already happy face was met with a racing heart of hir own at the mention of a sleepover "Assuming that it's fine with you Kid?" Truth be told Kid wasn't sure about hosting a sleepover, but when the blushing, hopeful face of hirs turned to meet his, it was almost unfair "If it's at the weekend, I should be more than capable of managing to do such a thing, after all the mansion's big enough for more than two." He said acting as if he was unaffected by the androgyne and hir excitement "Oh? I never said it had to be your place... though you do raise a good point. If you're both fine with it, then there's no harm done I guess." She smiled, happy that it had all been agreed upon.

Kid returned home, already trying to think ahead for the coming weekend which he now had plans for, opening the door he passed through the foyer and though the monotone corridors of Gallows Mansion until reaching his room. After a slight change of clothes, essentially appearing the same but without a suit-jacket or tie, he headed towards the kitchen only to meet Patty along the way "Oh hey, Kid! What's got you so happy?" Puzzled, Kid looked at her "Whatever do you mean? Do I appear happier than usual?"
"Well, kinda, yeah. Did anything interesting happen today?"
"Not especially, a few weird things in class but that's hardly new."
"Then... did you make some nice plans? Like meeting up Soul for a change or?..." Kid thought for a moment before remembering that, along with still needing to work out what they'd do, he had indeed made plans "The only plans I made were with Crona, ze (with some help from Maka) suggested we hang out at the weekend. Ze's even sleeping over..." He stopped and began to wonder before adding "But even then that still wouldn't explain why you thought I was happy, would it?" Patty shocked by such a reveal, just lied "No you're right, there's nothing special about that."
"I know, I mean if anything it means I have a lot of work to do."
"Exactly!" She agreed half-heartedly "I'm gonna go see Liz, see ya around."
"See you later" Kid said heading back in the direction of his room. Patty, seeing he was gone, rushed to see her sister "Liz! Liz!" She shouted opening the door to their room "What? What is it?"
"You're never gonna guess what I just saw and heard. Kid was really happy when he came into the kitchen!"
"...right?" Liz replied somewhat confused by where this was going "And when I asked him why, he said he didn't know but then when he thought about it he told me..." at this point Liz was interested and waited for her to continue "...he told me that he and Crona are having a sleepover at the weekend!" This put a shot of energy into Liz as she, along with Patty, started to squeal and laugh over Kid's inability to see what's in front of him.

A couple of days planning later and it was Friday, much to the happiness of Crona who had expressed hir anticipation since it'd been planned originally. In each and every class, while still paying attention, Crona visibly couldn't wait. Eventually the school day ended and most had gone home; Kid being one of the few left: being the son of Death can be a bit of a hassle when it comes to work. Kid was used to this and thought nothing of it anymore, but was surprised when he was met by a face he'd never seen around the school premises at this time "Crona? What are you still doing here? And at this time?" Before ze could answer he immediately began to worry, asking "Did something happen? Did you get into trouble? Did-" he stopped noticing the lilac haired androgyne was trembling slightly from being interrupted so suddenly "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have gotten ahead of myself... but still why are you here, as well as alone?"
"I-I wanted to... talk about tomorrow with you... b-but I knew that you'd be here pretty late, so I told Maka to go on ahead a little while ago..."
"I see. Well, you didn't have to wait for me; you could have invited me round or asked me during the day, you know." At this Crona became nearly scarlet coloured as hir face blushed furiously being noticeable even as ze stared at hir feet "W-well, I kinda thought that we could... maybe walk..." the rest being too soft to hear fully "I didn't catch the last part," Kid started "Did you say you wanted to walk home together?" Crona nodded, whilst still not showing any more than ze had to of hir bright red face, making Kid's face also become flushed at the confirmation. "I see... well I see no reason not too. Shall we head off now then?" Crona conveyed hir reply in the same fashion as before, and they headed off.

They were about halfway towards Maka's apartment and Crona had loosened up a bit now replying in more than just nods and shakes of the head. Kid was telling hir some of the things he had planned, checking that Crona was fine with the activities in question each time and asking about what he could change when there was a problem. Further along the way, Crona started a topic hirself asking what kind of time Kid planned to go to sleep, saying that ze went to bed at nine. Kid thought about it for a minute and began to let hir know, he was about half way through explaining his sleep schedule when all of a sudden Crona, still staring at hir feet, tripped on a kerb. Reflexively Kid grabbed Crona by the hand, as well as catching hir by the waist and helped hir back unto hir feet. "You should look where you're going more often, you know." Crona began to burn again being so close. Kid could almost feel hir burning up, in fact he could. It was at this moment he realised he was still holding hir hand and froze in panic unsure of what to do, regardless of the obvious solution to simply let go. It was at this point in time Ragnarok decided to make an appearance "You two gonna hold hands out here all day, or would you rather you got a room?" Kid dropped hir hand, placing his arm back alongside himself. Crona, now in less of an embarrassing position began to tell Ragnarok off "That's mean, say sorry to Kid you big meanie!"
"No, no. It's alright; I was, in all fairness, holding onto your hand for longer than necessary." Kid admitted "See it's fine you pipsqueak!" Ragnarok told Crona "It's still mean."
"Whatever." And with that he returned back into Crona. "Sorry about that, Kid."
"It's okay, really..." the air became filled with awkwardness as the sun began to fully pass by the horizon. "Shall we continue on then? There's not much left to go after all and we don't want to be out till it's dark." Crona nodded and gave a "Mmhm" and they headed off again. Crona began to look forwards, but out of habit eventually continued to stare at hir feet and soon after felt a hand grab hirs, looking in Kid's direction for the reason "If you're going to insist on staring at the floor, I'm going to insist you can't trip and hurt yourself. Is that something we can agree to?" he turned his head towards Crona for an answer to which ze turned away to face hir feet again. After nodding once more, Kid and Crona stayed as they were until they reached Maka's apartment. Kid then headed to his own place, and whilst his pulse slowly but surely calmed down to a normal pace, he realised he was unable to get Crona off of his mind 'This must just be because ze's coming round tomorrow and I'm still not a hundred percent finished, yes that must be it.' he told himself, not able to see another explanation, assuming finishing up the planing would rid him of these thoughts.

The day of the sleepover had arrived, it was very early afternoon and Kid was in a state of panic. He was pacing around constantly going over the check-lists in his mind "Who would have thought throwing a sleepover would be just as hard as a party... actually this may be harder..." Liz and Patty were fairly happy to not have to listen to his rambling, having decided to spend as much of the day as they could in their room, concluding that they wanted Kid and Crona to get as much, as Liz put it, 'alone time' as possible. A knock at the door came and Kid could tell it was Crona 'Ze's early it's only...' he turned his head to the clock and saw he'd spent more than a couple of hours pacing in the lobby and promptly (at the sound of a second set of knocks) got the door "You arrived at just about the time I was expecting you." Kid welcomed, noticing he was only talking to Crona "Has Maka left already? I didn't think I took that long to get the door." Crona shook hir head "She's been out with Soul on a mission today, that's why she suggested the sleepover for today..." Not more than a second had gone by before Kid entered a fit of worry "You were alone all day? You should have said; plus if I knew you were walking here by yourself I would have accompanied you." Kid took a breath and attempting to continue, stopped at the site of Crona welling up. He thought about it and quickly got on his knees and apologised, "I'm sorry it's not really you fault I'm just a bit on edge because this is also my first sleepover I'm a little unsure of how to really act." He confessed trying to give reason behind his actions. Crona sniffled a little before asking "It's your first sleepover too?" Kid nodded "I see," ze began to laugh slightly still teary eyed "I'm nervous too... that's probably why I cried so suddenly so I'm sorry too." Ze replied, bowing "You don't have to apologise for crying," Kid got back up "Why don't we just ignore that and begin again like nothing ever happened?" Crona nodded with a smile "I'd like that."

It was around eight and Crona had started to yawn a lot "Are you sure you'd not rather go to bed?" Kid asked again "I'm fine... I'll know when I'm tired enough to go to bed," ze turned hir sleepy looking face towards Kid with a light smile "Don't worry about me too much." Kid turned red and looked back at the screen, continuing the game they were playing, now hindered by a mass of thoughts. Maybe it was the drowsy look on hir face; maybe it was Crona being slightly more casual, but something was 'Cute?' he thought to himself 'I don't think I've ever seen anything as being cute... but it's almost the only word I can describe this as, ze's-' a message came up on the screen along with a voicing both saying "Player two wins!" Much to the delight of Crona, snapping Kid out of his train of thought "Okay then, rematch?" Crona went down to the aforementioned option and this went on for a small amount of time. About half an hour had passed and Crona let Kid know that ze was in fact tired now and so they headed off to bed "You go into my room and get settled I'll go grab the extra duvet and such." Kid said before heading down a different corridor. Crona reached his room and opened it slowly 'I-I've never been in here alone before,' ze realised 'It's a little scary... but this room reminds of Kid too much to really be scared' ze thought whilst walking over to the chair where he did hir hair, before going over to the seat beside his bed and sitting down. Not long after Kid entered the room "I said you could get settled you know."
"But you were getting the extra stuff for me still..." Kid though about it a moment before chuckling slightly "Ah, I see, you misunderstood. You're sleeping in my bed and I'm sleeping on the floor." Crona desperately tried to convince him otherwise but after no more than a few words was cut off by "I'm not going to sleep in my bed, so if you don't either; it'll go to waste." Crona pouted slightly before giving Kid a thank you. "Right, now that's all settled. How about I go get changed and grab us a few light snacks, while you get changed in here?"
"Okay then, but don't get too much... I don't want to anything to go to waste..." Kid acknowledged that and headed to the kitchen leaving Crona to get changed. A few minutes passed and Crona had finished changing, knowing Kid would be a little bit still (it being such a large mansion) ze sat down in the chair next to his bed again 'This is where Kid sleeps...' At first only touching the duvet, and the second hand connection that was there but eventually Crona caved in. Very tentatively ze leaned into the duvet and could smell a mix of freshly washed linen mixed with a stained smell of kid that Crona had come to love. But knowing Kid could return at any time ze pulled away and continued to wait for him to return.

Around another twenty minutes passed before kid returned "Sorry for taking so long, I got caught up talking to Liz and Patty." He explained, coming in back first with a tray in his hands. He put it on the side before turning to see Crona sitting in the chair where ze had hir hair cut now, in a floral white coloured; long sleeved nightie, reducing Kid to a hot mess "Wow... since when did you have that?" Kid asked trying to disguise his embarrassment as curiosity "Maka got it for me, she said I should wear something nice for my first sleepover... why does it not suit me?"
"No, it looks great." Kid, still unsure of what to say exactly, repeated "Really... great." This took Crona hirself by surprise not expecting such a response "O-oh... well th-thank you..." the room became silent "Um... I was going to ask... if you could brush my hair... because you do peoples hair I mean... so you probably do just the brushing part very well too..."
"Yeah... I guess I should... I mean logically speaking... I don't really know all that well myself..." the room was filled with a thick air of awkwardness still. Kid grabbed the brush from the table and began to brush Crona's hair and around this time Crona noticed Kid's red face in the mirror 'Wait, since when's his face been red? Didn't he get a little red when he saw me in this?' the thought of Kid blushing over how ze looks sent hir into a fit of happy bashfulness 'No it's probably a love of it being symmetrical or something... though I've never seen that kind of reaction...' hir mind wondered for a while, which incidentally was what Kid himself was doing. 'Why am I so flustered? It's just a piece of clothing on a person...' he thought back to earlier '...Does this have something to do with that thought about hir being cute?' saying that, if only in his mind, changed him from being slightly calmer to an even hotter and redder mess than before. A few minutes had gone by and they both managed to make it through the ordeal with either passing out, a quick look at the time and they both agreed they should head to bed, even if they did plan to talk to each other for a little bit. The atmosphere was a lot calmer at this point and they both slowly but surely began to run out of topics as the night went on "By the way, you said that Maka got your nightie for you?"
"Yes?"
"Do you not have a lot or did she just want to get something really special then?" Crona thought for a minute "Probably both, I don't have a lot of clothes to begin with..."
"Well if you want to, we could always go and get some clothes together. We can invite the others if you want?" Crona smiled "Mm, that sounds nice... I'll think about it..." ze said trailing off into a yawn "You sound really tired, shall we actually sleep now?" Crona nodded while yawning once more and they both fell asleep within a few minutes.

In the middle of the night Crona had began to toss and turn side to side, at first not awaking Kid but soon enough the noise had built. Confused by the early wake up Kid looked for a source for the sound finding Crona being the cause, which in turn changed his opinion on the matter from wanting to go back to bed, to needing to help Crona right away. He stood up slightly hunched by the side of the bed, before bending over to calmly wake hir up "Crona!" he whispered trying not to be too loud given the time "Crona wake up, it's just a dream!" a few more shakes back and forth before Crona returned to being fully conscious, hir eyes filled with tears and reaching out and grabbing Kid out of instinct to try and calm hirself. Another few moments and Crona realised that this isn't just anybody ze was clinging to but Kid, and so quickly attempted to part them before being brought back by Kid "Don't worry. If you need to cry, or just hold someone I'm more than willing to let you do it to me, okay?" Crona, welling up again, burrowed hirself back into Kid's pyjamas. Even though he was still not used to it he didn't like to see friends cry, but with Crona; it felt almost necessary to do this much. This left him confused but it was more important he calmed Crona down right now, which happened not too long after these thoughts. "It looks like you've calmed down a bit now," Crona nodded back "Now you don't have to tell me what caused this or anything like that, if you don't want to. But I need ask if you'll be alright to sleep again?"
"Well..." ze started "I think I probably could but..."
"But?" Kid echoed "But I know I'd feel a lot more at ease if you... that is if I... had a hand to hold, that is; your hand..." Kid thought about it, though it did make his heart flutter it was also filled with pain, much to his bewilderment "If it will help you get to sleep," he decided "I'm perfectly fine doing this for you." Kid held open his left hand palm, soon to be met by Crona's right. Kid, not being the one who experienced a nightmare, got to sleep fairly easily (still a little shaken up) but for Crona this was a much harder trial: enduring a nightmare to begin with, but also holding Kid's hand while ze lay there, plus the smell of kid of these sheets made it both blissful as well as near enough impossible to get to sleep.

Morning had come around and, though not getting a lot of sleep, Crona was the first awake. Going to move ze realised that Kid's hand was still holding Crona's hand, at first making hir panic before seeing that he was really still fast asleep 'I guess there's no harm in not moving my hand right? I mean... I don't want to wake him after all.' With this Crona smiled lightly gazing at the site of Kid sleeping and looking "Cute." Hir left hand shot up and fortunately he seemed to be a fairly heavy sleeper. Liz and Patty themselves were up early as usual, being well known frequent nappers "I wonder how last night went for Kid and Crona?" Patty mentioned to Liz "Well I'd guess it went pretty well."
"Hmm?"
"Well," Liz started "I looked into Kid's room through the tiniest crack of the ajar door, to see Kid asleep holding Crona's hand and I think ze was awake, still holding onto his hand."
"Oh my god! The both of them are just too... too cute!"